Increasingly important transactions are being conducted using personal electronic devices. Communications as well as transactions, including banking or other sensitive transactions, may be conducted using personal electronic devices.
Authentication of a user may be required to complete a transaction or to allow access to an electronic device. As known in the art public-key cryptography may be used to encrypt or decrypt communications, or to authenticate a user. Generally, public-key cryptography is a method for secret communication between two parties. It employs a pair of keys, one private, which is held secret, and one public, which is distributed. Messages are encrypted with the recipient's public key and decrypted with the recipient's corresponding private key. Other key-based cryptography systems are also known which involve the use of private and/or public keys for encryption. If one or more of the keys are compromised, or a device containing a key is misused, misplaced, or otherwise compromised, communications or authentication may be compromised. Similarly, if the authentication procedure becomes known, communications or authentication may be compromised.